Bree (11 year old Border Collie) went into the vet last Tuesday for scans, xrays and endoscope because over the past couple of weeks I'd noticed every now and then she had a little bit of trouble swallowing. When the vet examined her she could feel something in her neck/chest, hence Bree going in for the day on Tuesday.

The scans and xrays found a 2.5cm mass in her neck/chest, between her oesophagus and wind pipe, located next to a major blood vessel, which was aspirated and samples sent away for analysis. However, this mass wasn't thought to be the root of the swallowing problem, the scan picked up something further down just above her rib cage which is pushing in the left hand side of her oesophagus, but wasn't clear enough and will need a specialist MRI scan to determine what it is.

The mass results came back on Thursday and although there weren't enough cells in the sample, the lab feels very sure that Bree has thyroid cancer.

She is going in this Tuesday for the vet to open up her neck for a biopsy, but also to try to remove the lump, depending on what they find when they go in. The results will take a week to come back and based on that we have to decide whether to go ahead with the MRI scan/treatment, etc. There is currently no cancer in her lungs, that was picked up on the xrays.

Obviously I am praying for good news, although I'm preparing myself for the worst. The vet feels that, should the result come back as the worst case scenario which would be malignant and aggressive, there probably is nothing to be done, and the 'thing' further down her oesophagus is very likely related to the mass.

Currently Bree is happy as a little sandboy, she is exercising and playing and happy.

In January, routine blood tests showed she had higher pancreas levels than normal which have been steadily decreasing on a very low fat diet. She has lost a couple of kilos on this diet (I thought), but over the last couple of weeks seems to be more hungry and still losing. Could this be the lump affecting her thyroid function?

As you can imagine, I am beside myself with worry, she's my baby and not a dog who would be able to cope well with a lot of vet intervention, she is nervous and worries, although is a good girl for the vet when she has to go in. I read about CV247 some years ago and always had it in my mind that I would take this route if the worst ever happened, so am looking into this also.

Any experience of thyroid cancer would be really helpful and appreciated. Any good thoughts you could spare for my little Bear on Tuesday would also be gratefully received.

Thank you for all your good thoughts, and for the link to the other thread, the diet looks very doable.

Does anybody have any experience of thyroid/neck surgery? When I was speaking to the vet I only got as far as 'cancer' and 'surgery' and didn't think of asking the questions about afterwards: clearly she'll have to wear a harness instead of her collar, but I'm wondering about food and eating afterwards and assuming she'll be sore and need soft stuff, and whether she'll be all bandaged up or just a pad over her stitches. My brain sort of got stuck on 'cancer'.